Certificate dispensing devices are becoming increasingly more popular as a means for replacing human operators. These devices are being implemented in a variety of applications, such as for vending airline tickets, conducting financial transactions (i.e., Automatic Teller Machines), and more recently dispensing gift certificates. A conventional gift certificate dispenser is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,243,174 and is incorporated herein by reference.
Certificate dispensing devices have several advantages over their human counterparts. First, since they require a minimal amount of direct human assistance, they are considerably cheaper to run. Second, they can be located outside and inside, such as in all-night convenience stores, grocery stores and gas stations, so as to provide users with unlimited access 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Third, these devices are mobile and can be placed in multiple locations. Such mobility allows a company to expand its geographic market for the goods and/or services sold by the device.
Despite these advantages, theft and vandalism of these devices and their contents has been a continuing problem and as a result, have increased the costs associated with the operation of such devices. In an attempt to prevent theft and vandalism, safety features have been incorporated into existing devices to detect unauthorized access to the interior of the housing of the device. One such feature is the use of access codes which are only distributed to authorized personnel.
The certificates dispensed by the dispenser, however, are typically stored within the interior of the housing of the device. As a result, someone must be allowed access to the interior of the housing in order to load and reload certificates into the device. Whenever the housing is open there is a potential for theft. For example, unauthorized personnel may have improperly obtained the access code. It is also possible that authorized personnel are the themselves stealing the certificates. As the number and geographic scope of these devices increases, the potential for such theft also increases.
In the gift certificate vending industry, additional problems are present. Gift certificates have emerged due to increasing time constraints in the lives of busy people. They have also become popular among companies as a quick and easy way to give gifts to their employees, such as for Christmas, or for Secretary's Day. Currently, employees receive a pre-ordered form from their employer and select a purveyor of goods/services from a list provided. The employee mails this filled-in form to the gift certificate vendor, who then issues a complete gift certificate payable to the employee in the appropriate gift amount and from the purveyor selected by the employee.
The current procedure, however, essentially eliminates the very benefits of gift certificates, namely convenience. In addition, since the form must be returned to the gift certificate vendor before the employee can redeem it, processing costs are increased. This procedure also increases the risk that the form may get lost, damaged, or misplaced since it requires the user to temporarily lose control of it. Furthermore, since the employee never uses the gift certificate dispenser, the opportunity for her/him to become aware of and familiar with the dispenser is lost.
Accordingly, there is a need for a certificate dispenser that can identify, track and validate the issuance of certificates therefrom in order to prevent theft. There is also a need for a certificate dispenser that dispenses a gift certificate in response to the insertion of a pre-ordered form.